Routine maintenance of roadways is essential, efficient and cost-effective to sustain streets in good condition. The following high-quality maintenance programs are aimed at extending pavement life and improving levels of roadway serviceability on over 6,700 lane miles of roadway within the City limits.

Resurfacing Operation
Public Works, Street Maintenance maintains all public streets and Right of Ways (ROWs) within the City of Memphis limits. This includes the evaluation and selection of such streets as candidates for resurfacing. The Street Maintenance Department administers a Resurfacing Management Plan (RMP) to keep track of the resurfacing needs within the City of Memphis. This plan highlights streets that need resurfacing within a 5 year timeframe.

All streets receive a periodic evaluation for resurfacing needs. These streets are inspected and assigned a condition and urgency rating. The ratings are then entered into GIS street database. These ratings prioritize the streets and furthermore determine which streets will be added to the Resurfacing Management Plan.

Resurfacing is a process that typically involves the removal and replacement of the top 1.5 inch layer of asphalt. The goal in providing this service is to ensure the integrity of the street surface in accordance with acceptable standards and to extend the useful life of the street.

**In order to better manage pavement assets, the City of Memphis currently implements a “No Cut Streets” rule that prohibits the cutting of streets paved within the past 3 years.**

Pothole Patching
A process routinely used to repair minor irregularities in pavement surfaces. These irregularities can cause hazardous conditions and, in most instances, require immediate attention. The City of Memphis Street Maintenance repairs over 50,000 – 60,000 potholes yearly within city limits.

Full Depth Patching
Involves repair of compromised structural soil base, which include removing and replacing of backfill, before final surface asphalt is placed. Similar procedure is involved when repairing damaged underground infrastructure.

Public Rights-of-Way Maintenance
The City of Memphis Street Maintenance will trim overhang trees into public rights-of-way that may hinder driving and pose hazards to the community. Street Maintenance also removes fallen trees blocking public streets that prohibit continual traffic flow for public use. Street Maintenance also repairs damaged guardrails, and administers litter, grass/weed and graffiti control within public right-of-way.

Snow & Ice operation (anti-icing and de-icing)
It is the goal and intent of the City of Memphis to provide a timely, efficient, and cost-effective winter maintenance program. The City’s Snow & Ice Operation keeps bridges, overpasses, and inclines/declines on major thoroughfares in drivable condition. To have an accurate understanding of this responsibility, Public Works, Street Maintenance maintains an accurate listing by route of all the qualifying locations which are inspected and treated during snow & ice events. These routes encompass the entire City and segmented geographically.

The city’s primary focus during inclement weather periods is to first treat major streets with inclines/declines, as well as any bridges and overpasses. Secondly the city will treat the remaining major streets on an as needed basis. Hospitals, police and fire precincts will get special considerations during inclement weather conditions.

The City has two primary methods for snow and ice control, anti-icing and de-icing. Anti-icing is the application of salt brine to the road surface prior to inclement weather. The intent of this action is to prevent the bonding of the snow or ice to the road surface. De-icing involves the placement of salt combined with abrasives to the road surface once inclement weather conditions have started. The intent of this action is to remove snow and ice from the road surface.

FEDERALLY FUNDED ACTIVITIES

STP/ARRA Repaving
Public Works, Street Maintenance performs preventative maintenance and overlays of streets through use of Federal Transportation Funds when available. The City strives to make as many improvements as possible under State and Federal guidelines for the grant to the extent that the funding allows.